Daily Archives: February 26, 2013 - 5 results

A forensic engineering expert testified today that oil giant BP failed to heed safety recommendations and maintained an “imbalance of protection and production” in the years leading up to the Deepwater Horizon oil rig explosion that killed 11 people and released millions of barrels of crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico. Testifying on behalf of a group of Gulf Coast residents and business owners, retired University of California – Berkeley engineering professor Robert Bea said it was an “egregious” …

The United States Supreme Court heard arguments Tuesday on whether DNA samples can be collected from crime suspects without a warrant. In Maryland v. King, the court is expected to decide whether the policy of 28 states and the federal government to swab DNA from arrestees is a violation of privacy rights, in what Justice Samuel Alito called “the most important criminal procedure case this Court has had in decades.” At issue is whether taking DNA constitutes an invasive search …

Police everywhere must be thankful that crooks and thugs just can’t bear to leave their phones at home. In a recent case, a domestic abuse and kidnapping suspect with a bodacious hairstyle was captured thanks to phone tracking technology and Google Earth. Edward Johnson, 36, was tracked to a Philadelphia suburb based on location data from two calls he made on his cell phone. Law enforcement officials then pinpointed the specific block he was on using Google Earth. Johnson was …

The Puerto Rico Supreme Court last week upheld the island’s ban on same-sex couples adopting children, noting that the legislature could change the law if it wished. ‘The state … has not criminalized their sentimental relationship, but it does not have a constitutional obligation to award this relationship the same rights that other relationships have when it comes to adoption procedures,’’ the majority opinion said. The ruling quashed the efforts of a woman to adopt her 12-year-old child, who was …

When a high school football player, who has already suffered from several concussions on the field, dies after suffering yet another head injury in an unrelated accident at a school, who’s to blame? A lawsuit filed in Morris County, N.J., may answer that question – if it ever gets to a jury. Complicated Facts Michael Anthony Mason was 17 when he and his friends sneaked into a Bloomfield, N.J., middle school in 2010. Mason then climbed out a window …